Mardith Louisell

Two reasons for couples therapy

I was sure my partner and I needed therapy. Certainly I have faults, but the night before we left for a long weekend, I lay in bed concentrating on his. I had two major complaints. I didn’t know when but sometime during our three-day weekend I knew he would give me the opportunity to point them out.

I like to get out on weekends but he prefers to sit on the couch and watch PBS mysteries. When he finally agreed to go away, I pulled out my newspaper clippings and he pulled out his. He talked eight-hour drives; I thought two. He wanted dark redwoods; I wanted ocean light. He wanted to stay outside, snap photos, and eat trail mix. I wanted a comfortable place to read, hike a little, and eat pumpkin risotto. Soon, I was ready to abandon the whole trip and spend the money on therapy, but I knew he wouldn’t split the cost. He’d rather spend the money on a fourth hard drive for his computer.

Nevertheless, on a Thursday afternoon he pointed the car south toward California’s Big Basin Redwoods State Park. Big Basin because its three waterfalls were rated “9” by the San Francisco Chronicle and, since it had been raining for months, they would be obscenely full. Big Basin because he can make up his mind and I can’t.

It always happens like this. I vacillate and suddenly, instead of being on a plane to Paris, we are on Highway 101 heading north to camp in northern California’s marijuana-infested redwood groves. The last night on that trip, he placed himself in a slight depression on the ground and the pouring rain pooled directly under him, soaking his back while I slept, dry and comfortable. I wasn’t exactly glad he was wet, but it was satisfying.

Who cares about waterfalls — harsh hikes with unforgiving inclines? And then there was his cold. Why go hiking when he’s sick and hacking every few minutes? Even when he’s healthy he lags behind, always trailing by 10 feet.

“I hope you’re not going to be angry,” he said, halfway down the coast, “because I’m still coughing a lot.”

It was true. I do get irritated by things that are seemingly not his fault. But I couldn’t help but think he could do more about his cough. Everyone else had a cold or the flu but he insisted his cough didn’t require rest. “What makes you special?” I asked.

“I have post-nasal drip,” he said. “It’s a sinus issue, not a cold. Only colds require rest.”

I thought we would stay on the coast at a lodge, rustic but with full amenities. Instead we ended up at a motel painted resort red that looked like a converted Boy Scout camp. Our cabin smelled of disinfectant and drooped in the constant rain. No one would be delivering ricotta pancakes dripping with raspberry coulis, but he said we couldn’t afford the extra hour it would take to get from the coast to the park, “We need the time to see all three waterfalls.”

Once inside the park, I worried about the 10-mile, six-hour hike, categorized as “strenuous.” We were out of shape, and his post-nasal drip made him cough like a snorting mountain lion. “Everything doesn’t have to be mapped out,” I told myself. “If it doesn’t work, we’ll turn around. Just like I don’t have to know how our therapy discussion will go; we can turn back if it doesn’t work.”

10:30 a.m. Showers forecast, path muddy with yesterday’s rain. Ferns glom to the trunks of redwoods, Douglas firs, tan oaks, and every rock or wood surface handy. The heavy net of green, mysterious, like the inside of an algae-covered aquarium. On the path, tufts of dislodged celadon moss float like spider webs. The creek sloshes, gurgles, rustles, roars, and cranks out every other sound torrential water can make when rain has slammed into it for the past five months.

11:30. He tells me a friend is in relationship therapy. Hmm. I let that hang in the humid air for a minute.

“I was thinking we need to go to therapy,” I say off-handedly. Whenever I say we need to talk about our relationship or hint that friends find time to take romantic getaways, he says he feels pretty good about the relationship.

“For what?”

“For two reasons.”

“I feel pretty good about our relationship,” he said. “What are your reasons?”

“I can only think of one reason right now,” I say, “and I can’t tell you that until I can think of the other.”

Noon. Only three people pass us in an hour and a half. We dip, climb, dip, and climb. What was my second complaint? Don’t force it, I tell myself as I look at him, it will come.

12:30. Why was I hiking? Why wasn’t I reading in an upscale hotel room beside a vase of yellow and white tulips? Do I even like hiking? As a child I walked with my dad in the summer rain but I didn’t start hiking until I was 27 years old and lived in a rain forest on Vancouver Island. There, I hiked alone in the rain from the beach to the small fishing village of Ucluelet to call my brother on his wedding day. Hiking back, I was sure I heard a mountain lion.

1:00. We forge the 15th small lake of rain water and the balls of my feet burn. It’s annoying that he wades straight through the pools of water, while I, trying to keep my shoes dry, tiptoe on logs and drop farther and farther behind. “Use your time well,” I tell myself. “Think about five-year life goals.” But in the dark of the 1,500-year-old redwoods, life goals seem inconsequential.

1:30. Waterfalls. The first, Silver Falls, plummets in a thin diaphanous spray. The second, a few minutes later, is Golden Cascade, higher, fuller, more like a curtain. We find a place far enough from its roar to eat the lunches we packed. Our salad of raw broccoli and onion reminds me I read that raw vegetables can be poisonous. His tofu is good but my cheese and tomato sandwich is mushy and filled with bitter, yellowing cabbage. “Why is there cabbage in a cheese sandwich?” I wonder, and curse the town’s neo-hippie health food store.

2:00. Berry Creek Waterfall, the third, loveliest, most symmetrical, and most photographed. At the bottom, a lovely pool and bench surrounded by ferns and spray. At the top, a wide rock precipice, cascading water. Then, halfway down the 70-foot drop, two boulders divide the stream, which parts and then rejoins. A successful therapy.

3:00. Drizzle. We head back. In the dark of a March rain, redwoods are ominous. I plod slowly and carefully and he slipshods along. A ghostly green scrim settles between the woods and us so it seems we’re walking through the same exquisite scene over and over, stepping forward but not covering any distance.

The rain drenches our shirts and we speed up for a minute but our legs say slow down. I climb up the hills in front of him because his knees strain; coming down he walks in front because of mine. I do deep breathing to keep my feet moving and wonder how many mountain lions this stretch of redwoods supports.

3:30. “My oxygen levels have always been low,” he says. He’s had two open heart surgeries. Is he implying he could drop dead? I consider this. I look at his hunched posture, which I have mentioned to him a few times before. “Perhaps if you straighten up,” I suggest, “you could get higher oxygen levels.”

6:00. He thinks he sees a shortcut. Is he right? Could it be a mistake that will take us even longer? I follow him; it saves 15 minutes! I am so grateful I forget the cough, the oxygen levels, his splattering through puddles.
6:30. Cold and soaked but rejuvenated by seeing my car in the parking lot, we arrive back at the trailhead. “We could have done even another hour,” I say, “Don’t you think?”

At the motel, endorphic and quiet, we showered, rinsed shoes, stretched, napped, and watched two gardeners on BBC solve a mystery. At midnight, he stopped coughing and I listened to the rain slapping onto the roof and into the river.

To return to San Francisco the next day, we looped around to Pacific Coast Highway 1. At Half Moon Bay, he pointed out a hotel where we had stayed 10 years before. “How did we end up there?” I asked. “It’s not like you to stay in a hotel only 20 minutes from home.”

“It was when we first went out,” he said. “I was trying to show you I knew a thing or two.”

The coast did have more light — from the sun and because the expanse of the Pacific, even on a gray day, creates its own light as water droplets scramble in the air.

We drove up to Pacifica and ate at an upscale diner. The portions were large and the prices reasonable, but it wasn’t the pumpkin risotto for which I would have happily paid four times as much.

Still, driving north to San Francisco, I was smiling. He said, “I was worried you wouldn’t have a good time.”

Why would he think that?

It’s true Big Basin wasn’t exactly what I wanted, but I’m not sure what that was. It wasn’t pumpkin risotto, books, and chocolate, but it was an escape. I hadn’t thought about the fight I would have with AOL when I canceled my service, my two reports overdue by a month, or my chain-smoking downstairs neighbor pounding on her ceiling with a broom handle. I had wanted a peak experience that would lift me to a new world. Failing that, I at least wanted to come back a different person, someone not constantly irritated, who knew where she wanted to go and went. Big Basin wasn’t that, but I learned the difference between the trunk of a Douglas fir and that of a redwood. I walked under 200-foot-high canopies that filtered the light to emerald green. Our 10-mile hike generated endorphins that produced a mood as blissful as chocolate.

And I still can’t remember the second reason we needed therapy.

Share this:

Madgesw, thank you so much for reading it and enjoying it. You are on top of things, that’s for sure. I loved your post about your mom, which I read after you posted in response to my posting. I’m with you on the thinking about death all the time. Can’t say I’ve figured out if it’s bad or how not to. I spend some time planning a beautiful funeral with wonderful music! Thank you again for being such a great reader for all the Ipinion posters.

Maya North

I could feel my wet jeans and smell the mist-laden air. I also am as exasperated with my husband as I love him. It’s a bit like juggling a pair of breast implants — squishy, slippery, heavy but funny as hell. Glorious 😀

Paula Leahy

I love the free train of thought writing you do.. I see how you get from here to there.. love it.

Also, really nice descriptions of the things you see..and funny the thoughts you are thinking, and not so sure partner knows what they are.. nice conclusion..I so can identify.. goals for the next 5 years.. etc.. I remember after I retired and tried to get a job working for the airlines so I could travel for free.. the 22 year old interviewer asked me what my goals where.. I giggled like a crazy lady, telling her to stay alive and travel.. I don’t think that is what she meant…. but those were my goals! Thanks for the fun article.. so easy to identify with it.

Hah. I loved this. My husband just interrupted me half way thru reading and asked me why I was smiling and then he read it and said he didn’t get it. I answered: That is because you don’t want to go to couple’s Therapy. This is funny!

Mel

Caroljean

Mardi, I was snorting with the mountain lion. Worked a couple days ago with a friend hacking away so had a great laugh about that line. Most importantly for me, was I could feel you in the writing. Fun to be in the redwoods, if only in my mind. Woke to eight inches of heavy wet snow and lots of future work drag downed branches off the yard. Hugs

Brett Mann

Mardi, you’re a real pleasure to read, as always. I did not know about your solitary hike to Uculet and the distant mountain lion, but the incident fits quite well with the Mardi we all know and love. Keep ’em coming.

Mardi–Your second line made me laugh out loud as I frequently lie in bed thinking of all of Ben’s faults. I loved this piece. I read it tonight right after going away with Ben for the weekend (w/out kids), and finding myself on a 27 mile bike ride around Acadia Nat. Park when the longest distance I’ve gone in the last ten years is about 2.3 miles. I found myself on mile 22 cursing ocean views, the burning muscles in my legs, my aching derriere, and Ben’s figure in the far distance, easily pedaling up a mountain. But all was well on the descent to the parking lot, and later, curled up with my book next to Ben at the bed and breakfast.
This piece really made me miss you and your wisdom. Thank you for making me laugh, Mardi, at my own crazy thoughts and feelings.
Miss you–
Kate

Claire Kahane

What a funny and wise read this is! Your voice is absolutely pitch-perfect in this story. And such a convincing evocation of hiking in the redwoods, its glories and its miseries. I can still feel the spray of the falls, the dangers of mist on the trail. Great!

I love this piece even more the second time around. Wonderful prose and the tension between irritation and alteration is compelling. I can so relate to lines like “Don’t force it, I tell myself as I look at him.” Because of course the universal he will remind you soon of what irritates you most. Ha! I’m so with you on the pumpkin risottos and the tulips!

I enjoyed the story, even though it brought up uncomfortable relationship difficulties from the past.
I see an interesting conundrum, yet to be resolved. You won’t discuss couples therapy until you discover the second reason to undertake the process. Yet the point of the process may be the discovery of the second (as well as the third, fourth and fifth) reason.

Madgesw, thank you so much for reading it and enjoying it. You are on top of things, that’s for sure. I loved your post about your mom, which I read after you posted in response to my posting. I’m with you on the thinking about death all the time. Can’t say I’ve figured out if it’s bad or how not to. I spend some time planning a beautiful funeral with wonderful music! Thank you again for being such a great reader for all the Ipinion posters.

David, thank you. I really appreciate it, and the comment about the imagery.

Maya North

I could feel my wet jeans and smell the mist-laden air. I also am as exasperated with my husband as I love him. It’s a bit like juggling a pair of breast implants — squishy, slippery, heavy but funny as hell. Glorious 😀

I love the free train of thought writing you do.. I see how you get from here to there.. love it.

Also, really nice descriptions of the things you see..and funny the thoughts you are thinking, and not so sure partner knows what they are.. nice conclusion..I so can identify.. goals for the next 5 years.. etc.. I remember after I retired and tried to get a job working for the airlines so I could travel for free.. the 22 year old interviewer asked me what my goals where.. I giggled like a crazy lady, telling her to stay alive and travel.. I don’t think that is what she meant…. but those were my goals! Thanks for the fun article.. so easy to identify with it.

Hah. I loved this. My husband just interrupted me half way thru reading and asked me why I was smiling and then he read it and said he didn’t get it. I answered: That is because you don’t want to go to couple’s Therapy. This is funny!

Debbie Lowery

Mardi, this was a great thing to read! So much a reminder that if you get out and see things from a different vantage; you may no longer be moved to couples therapy. It was a great read.

Mel

So funny and beautiful. And great since I know both of you I can really visualize it.
This is probably not unlike me and my husband.

Caroljean

Mardi, I was snorting with the mountain lion. Worked a couple days ago with a friend hacking away so had a great laugh about that line. Most importantly for me, was I could feel you in the writing. Fun to be in the redwoods, if only in my mind. Woke to eight inches of heavy wet snow and lots of future work drag downed branches off the yard. Hugs

Brett Mann

Mardi, you’re a real pleasure to read, as always. I did not know about your solitary hike to Uculet and the distant mountain lion, but the incident fits quite well with the Mardi we all know and love. Keep ’em coming.

Brett

Christine Dill

Interesting and true the transition from frustration to a more peaceful acceptance…just what a vacation is supposed to do, isn’t it?
Ahhhh, Mother Nature. Thanks, Mardi

Mardi–Your second line made me laugh out loud as I frequently lie in bed thinking of all of Ben’s faults. I loved this piece. I read it tonight right after going away with Ben for the weekend (w/out kids), and finding myself on a 27 mile bike ride around Acadia Nat. Park when the longest distance I’ve gone in the last ten years is about 2.3 miles. I found myself on mile 22 cursing ocean views, the burning muscles in my legs, my aching derriere, and Ben’s figure in the far distance, easily pedaling up a mountain. But all was well on the descent to the parking lot, and later, curled up with my book next to Ben at the bed and breakfast.
This piece really made me miss you and your wisdom. Thank you for making me laugh, Mardi, at my own crazy thoughts and feelings.
Miss you–
Kate

Claire Kahane

What a funny and wise read this is! Your voice is absolutely pitch-perfect in this story. And such a convincing evocation of hiking in the redwoods, its glories and its miseries. I can still feel the spray of the falls, the dangers of mist on the trail. Great!

Kay

Mardi, I made the mistake of reading everyone else comments and found myself agreeing with all of them. I loved reading this! Keep on writing. Kay

I love this piece even more the second time around. Wonderful prose and the tension between irritation and alteration is compelling. I can so relate to lines like “Don’t force it, I tell myself as I look at him.” Because of course the universal he will remind you soon of what irritates you most. Ha! I’m so with you on the pumpkin risottos and the tulips!

I enjoyed the story, even though it brought up uncomfortable relationship difficulties from the past.
I see an interesting conundrum, yet to be resolved. You won’t discuss couples therapy until you discover the second reason to undertake the process. Yet the point of the process may be the discovery of the second (as well as the third, fourth and fifth) reason.